


Probable Claws

by moonmunk



Category: Original Work, werewolves - Fandom
Genre: Fantasy, Ghosts, Ghouls, M/M, Multi, Murder Mystery, Nightlife, Supernatural things, Vampires, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2020-02-10 04:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18652918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonmunk/pseuds/moonmunk
Summary: In a world where the things that go bump in the night are very much so real, a detective with a secret, a chief of police with a whole mess of growing problems, and a witch with a crush have to figure out whodunnit in an original murder mystery with a hopefully familiar concept.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so I'm finally writing my own story here, not a fanfiction not anything like that. I'm hoping that I can continue on with this series because I already like these characters so far. I have big plans for this one, and I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I'm going to enjoy writing it!

I think I speak for almost everyone when I say that sleeping is, by far, one of the best things an individual can do for themself. In this day and age of self care, I think that everyone should recognize that a proper full eight hours of restful slumber is by far the first and best step towards maintaining proper mental health. As a matter of fact, this belief is so deep seeded in my mind that I not only take advantage of it myself to the fullest extent, but, I encourage everyone to follow suit whenever I get the chance. It's because of this mindset and firm belief, that when I was woken up at four in the damn morning by an unnecessarily loud 8-bit ringtone, my thoughts were not filled with fond memories of a short elf wearing tights and wielding a magical sword. Rather, they were filled with an intense fury that threatened much worse things.

Naturally, I took the time to try and calm down before picking up and answering with a growl.

“What?”

“Wow, Jesus Damien calm the fuck down. We’ve got a situation; I need you here.” The voice was all too familiar. A low but gentle one, baritone, but lacking the subtle growling undertones of my own voice; a voice that could thus only belong to my boss.

Needless to say, this didn’t help me calm down at all. “You got a case for me? 'Cus if you’re calling me out so I can pick up your son from another fucking soccer game I swear to the gods that b-”

“No you dick we’ve got a case. Besides that was one time. Are you still holding that against me?”

“Yeah. I am. It was stupid and unnecessary. Send me the address.” I ended the call before he could respond then tossed the phone on the bedside table and tried to rub the sleep out of my eyes. Annoying as it was at times, being on the force wasn’t too bad of a deal, even if I was an outcast within the team and my boss was one of the few people that had the balls to actually smack me down from my bullshit. As much as I hated it, it was somewhat reassuring.

I didn’t think I’d wake up any time soon, but I suppose crime doesn’t sleep either so why should I?

Crime was an asshole.

I rolled out of bed and worked on getting dressed in what I called my ‘work clothes’, which was essentially a black leather jacket, white shirt, jeans, boots and a grumpy ass frown. I brushed my teeth and waited for the location of the incident. For someone who apparently desperately needed me, John sure was taking his sweet time to get me the hell out there. It gave me just enough time to have a moment of introspection at the bathroom mirror.

I hated moments of introspection.

I looked… Not very much at all like I used to. I remember when I was in highschool. I was your standard… chubby awkward kid. Not exactly what you’d call an athlete in any way. Aaand then puberty decided to hit me with a brick shithouse, along with a few other things. Apparently due to my family lineage, we tend to turn into the perfect little killing machines when puberty hits. I went from about 4’6” to 6’4” in the course of a summer, which let me tell you… hurts like a bitch. My voice got deeper, I sounded like I swallowed gravel for breakfast, and I grew facial hair and muscles that rival Hugh Jackman. The process wasn’t attractive, I didn’t feel attractive, and certain nights really didn’t look very attractive  Needless to say, I didn’t leave the house during that summer.

I finished up the normal process of waking the fuck up and walked out of my bathroom, looking over what I jokingly call my kingdom. It wasn’t much: a simple one bedroom apartment over a mom and pop restaurant. Nothing too special, but it was home. And the food at the restaurant actually wasn’t half bad so that was always a plus.

My phone buzzed on the bedside and I breathed a sigh of relief, grabbed it, and headed out to the scene.

It ended up being at a warehouse past downtown Tucson. Upon closer examination, it ended up just being another factory for… shall we say… adult toys. Not that I minded things like that, but it was always a little awkward for me. I had to be careful about _those_ items. Giving into certain urges and desires could land me in a bit of a furry situation if I didn't tread cautiously.

Like with most crime scenes it was surrounded by police tape, which I simply walked under. Cop cars and other officers crowded here and there. There wasn't any sign of trouble outside, so that was… good I supposed. Though, there was a door ripped off its hinges that told me immediately that whoever did this was more than likely not a worker here.

I opted to ignore the other cops for now, choosing instead to go straight past them and into the doors where I was met by that same familiar voice.

"Damien, took you long enough! Get over here."

I rolled my eyes and cautiously circumvented a few boxes to make my way to the chief, wrinkling my nose at the horrid smell of the area. My nose was filled with death, blood, wet dog, a faint scent of electricity and… fear. This person was scared in their final moments. Which made sense when you looked at the body. Claw marks,torn skin, and meat taken off of bone. I had my theories, but I held  off on entertaining those until I got some more information on what I was dealing with here.

"John. Pleasure to see you, as always." I held out my hand and he took it, giving a firm shake. He was a big guy; a little shorter than me with dark black shaggy hair, cut about medium length and pulled back to keep it from flying all over the place. He had a bit of a beard that, while normally I wouldn't like, actually looked pretty alright on him. He looked tired, dark rings under the eyes and a pissed off expression.

"Of course Wulfe. Why is it that we never meet up at a bar or something? It's always gotta be over a body."

I shrugged. "I wouldn't exactly consider us buddy-buddy. You're my boss." He met me with a tight smile and then a shrug. It wasn't… entirely a lie. We have known each other since high school, well before any of my own stuff had happened. I'm not gonna lie, we hated each other. It was only after I turned 17 that him and I had become… uneasy acquaintances. We had joined up with the police force at about the same time, but he had big dreams for it. Where I saw it as a job, he wanted it as a career. Naturally, because of that, I went into detective work and he became the chief of police. This, of course, put us at odds, even if only a small bit. I didn't like authority too much and he didn't like being undermined.

"Be that as it may, it'd still be nice to see you without a wrinkled nose."

I rolled my eyes and directed my full attention to the body, pulling on gloves and leaning down next to it. "So what can you tell me?"

He shrugged. "Standard affair. Security came in to check that everything was copacetic, found the body, and called us as soon as he could stop shaking."

"Where is the guard? Do you know?"

John pointed a thumb over his shoulder. "He's over there. We haven't let him go yet. Gotta get a testimony and all that good shit. You know how it goes."

I nodded and continued looking over the body. A young man, probably in his mid to late 20s. "What was our John Doe doing here?" I looked at the area around the body. Nothing about this was clean. The body looked like a bear had came in and just had a fun time with it, but there wasn’t really any blood in the room outside of the immediate vicinity of the body itself. It was odd. I’d seen enough deaths along these lines to know that there should be viscera… just about everywhere actually.

“We’re not sure, if I’m being perfectly honest with you. I was kind of hoping that you would be able to come up with something for us.”

I sighed. “Alright well… Let me talk to the guard real quick, see what he knows first.” I stood up fully before walking over to the guard, leaving John behind.

“Hey. How ya holding up?”

“Well… There’s a dead body on the floor… In the place I’m supposed to be guarding, so I think I’m doing pretty fuckin peachy there.” He glared up at me and I raised an eyebrow, crossing my arms. He furrowed his brow. “What are you supposed to be? Some dollar store Wolverine?”

I felt my temper flare, and a familiar voice scratched at the back of my mind.

_How very rude of him. You should kill him. Rip him from limb to limb and eat his spleen._

I gave an inward sigh before telling the voice to shut the fuck up. Now wasn’t the time.

“I prefer Bigby Wolf myself, but whatever. Look I ain’t here to shoot the shit with you. I just figured that the pleasantries would be better received than doing everything with a stick up our asses.” I wasn’t in the mood to deal with this kind of bullshittery tonight. “When did you notice the body?”

He continued his glare, before finally relenting. “About 3. I was doing my hourly check and the body was here. Called the police immediately.”

I nodded and pulled out a notebook, starting to write this shit down. I wanted to be able to keep it all straight. “You said your hourly check? How’d you miss the body during the previous check?”

“Body wasn’t here. Plain and simple as that. Any other stupid questions?”

_It would be so easy. Just rip his throat out… He’s being a dick right now.”_

I growled a bit, but didn’t let the voice win. “Alright, smartass. Here’s a ‘dumb question’ for you. How did you not hear the door being ripped off the hinges over there, huh? Isn’t it kinda your job to watch over shit here and make sure that that exact thing doesn’t happen?”

He blanched at that one, understandably so. I called him on his shit. “Oh… Uh… Well I was watching something… In the office.”

I raised an eyebrow. “So you were shirking your duties because you were watching some fuckin’ movie?”

“Uh… Y-Yeah…”

I groaned. “Well I hope it was a damn good one. Was anyone in here besides you tonight? Like… particularly that guy over there?”

“I assume you mean before he died.”

I was really starting to dislike this guy. “No, Einstein. I want to know if he got up and walked after he was a half devoured corpse.”

The glare returned, my sarcasm apparently going un-appreciated. “No. There was no one here. I’ve been alone in this warehouse since midnight.”

I smirked. “Well… At least you’ve got plenty of shit here to keep you occupied.” I nudged one of the boxes with my toe before turning and walking back to John and the body, closing my book as I went.

“Get anything useful?” John asked with a smirk. “You looked like he was pissing you off.”

_This one also could stand to be firmly silenced…_

I pinched the bridge of my nose to hopefully appease the suddenly growing headache threatening to take over. “The body was moved here from somewhere else. I.e. this wasn’t the murder site.”

“Think you can figure out where he was murdered? That’s… kind of important.”

“I mean… maybe? I’m not a superhero or anything.”

He rolled his eyes. “No, but you do have a super sniffer that none of us have.”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “So wait. You’re asking me… to sniff this body, and despite the scent of blood and urine… find out where the fuck this guy was murdered.”

John sized me up and crossed his arms. “That is exactly what I’m asking. Is there a problem?”

“Yes, as a matter of fuckin’ fact there is. My nose isn’t good enough right now for tracking.”

“Your nose is always good enough for tracking. You’ve done it before, I’ve seen you.”

I growled, temper rising. “No, Valentine, you aren’t understanding me. My nose isn’t good enough _like this_ for me to do what you’re asking for.”

He stared at me angrily for a minute before understanding crossed his face. “Oh. Right… Forgot there was a process to that. When can it be?”

I shrugged and looked around. “With everyone here? No fuckin clue, but it better be soon. Don’t want the trail going cold, ya catch my drift?”

He sighed “Right… Okay give me about 10 minutes, I’ll see what I can do. You, in the meantime, need to find a safe space to do your thing.”

I groaned but nodded. I wasn’t excited at all for this. It was a painful process, doing what I do that is, but I didn’t have much of an option. The trail would go cold if I waited too long. “Just a warning, make sure that the guard is out of here before I come back okay?” With that, I turned on my heel and walked out of the area, off to find a nice safe spot away from any prying eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The dog days are just beginning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So small disclaimer on this one, for those of you who are reading this in the future this won't matter so much but for those of you who are reading it shortly after I post it it will. I want to post these as soon as possible so basically what's going to happen is once I finish writing them you're going to get them, these will be what are considered to be rough drafts. When my editor reads through them and actually edits them I'll go through and put in the edited version. I just... really want to put out the story and I'm impatient.
> 
> That being said, thank you to Siren-Not-Mermaid and Benadryl for being my editors. You two are the best

Have you ever been ran over by a giant steam roller, then brought back to full functionality, with the same amount of pain, then ran over again? I didn’t think so… But if you had, than you’d know exactly what the transformation felt like. It’s why I didn’t do it if I didn’t have to, and why I was not excited when John brought up the idea in the first place.

I could feel with excruciating detail every bone in my body breaking and snapping into new positions that the human body should not reasonably be able to take. It started as it always did, my nose elongating into a snout, breaking my nose and stretching my jaw. From there my legs snapped apart, almost eliciting a howl of pain out of me that I barely managed to suppress. They came back significantly more canine-esque as I was dropped to all fours. Simultaneously, fur came out of every inch of my body as my hands and feet turned into paws, My ribs expanded and I could feel a tail protruding from my lower back. My teeth elongated and turned into sharp fangs, and the pain of it forced me to open my eyes. I could finally see the world clear as day. My hearing was tripled and my sense of smell… Holy shit was that improved, to an almost debilitating extent until I got used to it.

When I finally did grow accustomed to it again, and the pain subsided, I was full on wolf. A black and grey wolf standing at a shoulder height of 4’ 3”. I was fairly big for a wolf, to be perfectly honest, but that was purely due to my heritage, one that I chose to ignore whenever I had the option. My mom was the alpha of the Tucson pack, and by right I was slated to inherit the title when the time came that she could no longer bear it. Of course there was a whole “You have to go and fight anyone who would challenge your position as alpha and beat them in a fair brawl if you want to be alpha” thing, but my size and my ability to take on the leadership role easily meant that I wasn’t likely to be challenged if that’s what I wanted to do. Which I didn’t.

I never wanted to be Alpha. Sacrifice your freedom and livelihood to command and lead the pack towards… some sort of goal? That never appealed to me. I was always perfectly content to remain the outlier, the one that’s always been a bit detached from the rest of the group and strikes out on his own. My mom called it “Lone Wolf Syndrome”, I think because she couldn’t resist the pun. I called it “wanting to choose my own life”.

Regardless it was probably fated to happen, but I’ll be damned if I’m gonna allow some disambiguous force of nature put me into a position I don’t want without a fight.

_ Can you stop whining about reality for a minute and get back to your damn job? _

I growled at my inner wolf. He was a bit louder when I was in this form, and it was harder to block him out. That being said, he did have a point. I lifted my head towards the warehouse and took a couple of hesitant sniffs, then immediately sneezed.

There was some strange magic in the air here. I was not a fan whatsoever.

Magic, in a situation like this, begged for my attention. I figured that werewolves were involved in this, we didn’t have many bears or wolves in this town, and coyotes had no chance in hell of leaving marks anywhere close to the absolute gore show sitting dead in that warehouse, but I knew what werewolves smelled like, as well as the magic that surrounds the transformation.

This was far from it. This was something dark and, as far as I could tell, ancient as hell.

I watched as the cops vacated the building. As soon as the security guard followed I padded to the warehouse, sticking to the shadows as much as possible. It was hard to be stealthy when you were the size of a small horse, but I did my best.

I made my way into the warehouse through the broken door and started sniffing around, ignoring John watching me from the corner. The scent wasn’t honestly too hard to pick up, but it was muddled under magic, blood and gore. There was a scent of death under all of it, which was actually fairly helpful, as well as the scent of very distinct male musk and a small hint of the chocolate body spray which was… not a fun scent as a wolf.

_ I bet he was killed because of the Axe… he smells like a locker room. _

There were times, rare as they were, where my inner wolf made a comment that was actually pretty funny. I responded by chuffing, the closest thing to laughing I could do as a wolf.

“What is it boy? Is Timmy stuck in a well?” John was walking up to me, I think in response to my sudden noise. I responded with a growl before turning my head towards the broken door.

“I could kinda figure the whole door thing. Are you gonna be able to lead me from there?”

I nodded at him before starting to pad out, nose to the ground and trying to keep the scent active. I didn’t really care if John was following me, but I could hear his footsteps behind me so that was… reassuring I suppose.

There’s an interesting thing about following scents in reverse that people don’t often consider. Nine times out of ten, they get weaker the further you get from the source. I feel like in movies and stories they always gloss over that detail. You’d have to have something along the lines of an olfactory system that is at least 50 times more powerful than your average human’s.

Luckily for us, as a wolf mine was about 100 times more powerful than a humans.

Also luckily for us, our victim had a really shit taste in what can very loosely be considered to be cologne. It was the great thing about living in the modern age; almost everyone and their brother had to have a distinct and recognizable scent, even if that distinct scent was shared between them and a large amount of the american population at all.

Don’t get me wrong, the trail was a bit difficult to follow once we got into the thick of it. Once we got back to the trees the scent got muddled by dust and mesquite trees. I had to actually lift my nose away from the ground for a bit just to keep the right scent in my nose, but it paid off in the end.

It wasn’t terribly long before we were in a small clearing, a nice little place to hang out and chill… at least it was before someone was brutally murdered and their blood was spilled all over the goddamned place by a werewolf. There were bits of flesh ripped here and there, blood splattered on just about every surface that could hold onto it, and an intestine hastily discarded off in a corner. I raised an eyebrow at that particular detail. Most werewolves that were on a killing spree tended to not leave much meat behind.

_ Amature. Everyone knows you do your best to leave as little of a mess as you can behind… Especially when you’ve got us looking for murderers. _

My wolf had a point. Whoever had done this definitely wasn’t used to being a werewolf yet. We tended to make clean and fast kills. You go for the jugular and make it fast so that all this struggle didn’t happen. I huffed out a breath and started padding about, looking for something that might help us out with an identity. John trotted up behind me.

“Jesus fucking Christ! This is a damn blood bath!”

I turned to look at him and raised a brow.

“Look I know I expected something along these lines but this is a lot. I don’t think these trees will ever be the same.” He started following suit, putting gloves on again and searching for something helpful. I padded up to the intestines and started to sniff at them. They definitely belonged to our John Doe, as if that wasn’t obvious enough as is.

_ You should eat the intestine. It’s going to waste just sitting here. _

What? No. That was a thing that was most definitely not happening.

_ Why not? You’re hungry aren’t you? It’s here. There’s no reason not to chow down on it. _

There were many reasons not to chow down on it, and I told my wolf as much. I was met with a slightly disgruntled sigh.

“So from the looks of it, this was a painful kill. Large amount of a struggle. Am I safe in assuming this was some wolfy business?”

I gave him a look that, even in wolf form, screamed “Are you fucking serious?” before nodding.

“Hey don’t give me that look. I have to be thorough. Do you know if it was one of yours?” he blinked when he saw my face, then thought on it. “Oh I’m sorry, I meant your moms.” I nodded my head. “You know I still don’t understand that dynamic. You say your mom is the alpha of the tucson pack, but shouldn’t that be you?”

I gave a low warning growl and he put up his hands. Now was definitely not the time for this line of questioning, and we had gone over it too many times to count already. It wasn’t my fault that he wasn’t able to fully grasp it.

“Alright alright I’ll leave it alone for now. Let’s just figure out what happened here.”

I continued to sniff around, trying to find anything that would help us identify the killer. It was hard to distinguish anything from the horror show in the clearing, but in time I caught that familiar twinge of electricity. I followed it past the edge of the clearing, allowing my nose to guide me, before finally coming up on some ripped clothes. I yipped to get John’s attention before sniffing the tattered remains of a pair of pants.

“Well… Someone who's not wearing clothes should be obvious to find. Hey what’s that?”

I let out a small noise of confusion before looking over to where he was pointing. There was a barrel cactus not too far away from the clothes, with blood and fur on it. I chuffed a bit at that. Whoever had done this must have run into the cactus shortly after the transformation. I had done that a few times, when I first started turning. It hurt, and it had an added benefit of giving you the most painful bald spot for the hour until it healed up fully. I think it’s safe to say that cacti and wolves usually don’t get along too well. They always ended up getting underfoot and causing some major discomfort for a bit. They were like… Young werewolf kryptonite, provided you lived in a town that had a fair amount of them.

John walked over and pulled out some tweezers and an evidence bag. It always surprised me when he came prepared, He just never seemed the type, yet here he was, pulling fur and sinew off of a small round and pointy.

When he finished collecting his evidence and making sure it was secure, he stood up fully and looked at me. “Can you pick up anything off of this asshole to track him further?”

I sniffed at the air a few times, then towards the cactus and was sorely disappointed. Werewolves were hard to track for other wolves. If you weren’t a part of the pack, the magic surrounding our transformation tended to mask up our scent pretty fast from other wolves. I think it’s a preservation thing. If we were super easy to track via other werewolves, there’d be blood sports and inter-pack hunting going on all over the place. Constant feuds were not something that humans, or really anyone, wanted around. I shook my head and he sighed.

“Damn magic creatures.” He raised an eyebrow at me. “Think you can find some way to find them without the use of your nose?”

I thought on it, then nodded and pointed at the bag.”

“I thought you said he couldn’t be tracked by scent.”

I shook my head then held up my paw towards the bag, before placing it on the ground in front of me in a very deliberate gesture. John gave me a slightly uncertain look before relenting and placing the bag on the ground in front of me.

“Dunno what you’re gonna do, and I don’t want you to tell me. Just make sure it gets done, preferably fast, alright?”

I nodded and took the bag by the edge in my teeth, being as gentle as I could with it before running off. I heard John mumbling something about “Stupid dogs… You better not make me look bad.” before I ran even faster to my clothes. I had a job to do, and his involvement in it wouldn’t do me any good. The supernatural side of the world didn’t fully trust the mortal police getting into their business, so I needed him to stay far the fuck away from where I was going so that I could get the information I needed without him muddling up their sensitive sensibilities.

I got back to my clothes, reversed the process of the change, got into my clothes and started to drive off. I could tell it was going to be a loooong day.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien finally gets home to think things over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The introduction of my favourite character comes here guys, I hope you like him as much as I do!

The disadvantage to being woken up at 4 in the morning tends to be the fact that when you get done with your daily necessities, nothing is ever open. What I needed right now, was a witch, and the only one that I had easy access to in town ran a little magic shop on fourth. Unfortunately it wasn’t open until noon. Which meant that I had about 6 hours of doing absolutely nothing but wallow in my own thoughts. The reality of it is I didn’t take much time to wallow, but collecting thoughts was a favourite past time for me. 

So there was a werewolf that killed a guy. Honestly, not surprising. In other parts of even the country much less the world it was a pretty common occurrence. Problem was that there was only one pack in Tucson, my mothers. She was the caring sort of person, determined to make sure that as little humans could get hurt as possible, and picking up new werewolves whenever she could. I couldn’t imagine that this was one of her pack, but I had been wrong before. Not all of them were exactly top notch individuals, but she kept a pretty strong hold on what they did and didn’t do when it came to murder.

Which means that this is a completely new wolf that my mom didn’t know about. That would make this a little difficult. As I said earlier, tracking wolves outside of the pack can be difficult as hell, hence the need of a witch.

Witch magic was a bit dampened on wolves, yet another advantage that we have to protect ourselves and our pack, but it still did work depending on certain circumstances. In the event of a tracking spell, you’d have to have a loooot of DNA from the target. Luckily, I had a handy little bag of fur, blood and flesh sitting in my passenger seat. In theory a good witch could come up with a good tracking spell to find this mystery wolf, provided she doesn't end up screwing the pooch and blowing up everything right in our faces.

But that would, naturally, have to wait. For now I elected to drive back home. Hopefully I could sneak in through the side door and grab a shower before anyone else disturbed my day with random acts of murder.

I followed my normal routine, stepping in through the side door and climbing up the stairs to one of the two main doors of my own little apartment. I had been tempted to block off the one that led down towards the back room of the restaurant below, but people still liked to come up through that one from time to time with random bits of information or interesting trivia. It was easier to just keep it locked at just about every conceivable time of day until I needed to use it. As soon as I got into my apartment and locked my door, there was a knocking on the other, as if with serendipitous timing to annoy the shit out of me.

I growled and stormed over, checking through the peep-hole before sighing and opening the door with a minor amount of annoyance.

"Hey Mooney! Saw your car gone this morning so I figured you probably didn't get any breakfast either and I thought I'd bring you up some!" The voice that rang through my ears was a chipper one, with a slight Nordic accent to it. The man that accompanied it was someone I'd actually be rather pleased to call a friend.

Alex Eskildsen was an interesting individual, standing about 5 foot nothing with medium length scraggly blond hair and shocking blue eyes. He had feminine features, high cheekbones and just the right amount of weight to his face to make him look pretty, without being overpoweringly so. Square rimmed glasses sat perched on a pretty standard nose and a big bright smile rested below that. He was wearing his work uniform, being a waiter at the restaurant, which hugged his body pretty nicely. He wasn't big and muscular, quite the opposite. He had a small frame with little hints of muscles that were never fully developed under pale skin that almost seemed to glow in the right light.

He also happened to have some pretty impressive curves, if I were paying attention to that sort of thing… which I most definitely was not.

_ Yes you are. Admit it, pretty boy is… well… pretty. _

I cursed under my breath at my wolf to shut up and Alex raised an eyebrow.

"You alright there bud?"

I blinked out of my giggling of the poor man in front of me and shrugged "rough day. Come on in" I left the door open for him before going to the fridge and nabbing a soda, then sitting on the couch. As always Alex came in, closed the door behind him and went to the kitchen.

"You know you really should go out and buy more dishes, I don't know how you can begin to stand only having two of everything!"

I shrugged "never had the reason. I live by myself Alex, why would I need more than two?"

"By that logic shouldn't you only have one of everything?"

I shook my head "nah mate. Two, so that I can use the other one when the first first one is dirty. Got this down to a science."

I could practically hear the eye roll and the faint mumbling was very obvious to me, something about stubborn men and me needing to take better care of myself. Our interactions have been pretty much like this since shortly after I moved in to this place. It started about a month after I settled in, he noticed that when he happened to catch me come home I never brought any groceries or anything like that, so he brought up some food, I think it was in part a peace offering. Something along the lines of a "hey let's be friends" sort of thing. From then he came by about once a week, usually with a shit ton of food, since he found out that my appetite could be a bit difficult to manage on normal proportions, and he'd chastise me about taking care of myself and I'd deflect it as quickly as I could.

Part of me found it annoying, from time to time. But my wolf actually liked him so I figured there was some important reason to deal with the occasional meddling.

Alex apparently finished up what he was doing in the kitchen and came back over with two plates, I was a bit disgruntled from knowing I'd have to wash both of those now. The one he put in front of himself was a pretty standard affair, cheeseburger, fries etc. The one he put in front of me, however, was stacked high with different meats, bacon steak burger patties etc, all barely cooked and mostly raw. He never questioned why I liked my food raw, and that was something I appreciated from him.

"So," he picked up a fry and popped it into his mouth. "What made your day so rough? I mean it's only 6:30 and you're already looking tired and stressed out. You need to like… take an herbal bath or something, take time to calm down."

I rolled my eyes. "Nah, don't need it. It's just been… stress inducing. There was a death this morning."

He raised an eyebrow "Well I'm sure they wouldn't have called you in if it was just a death. I'm assuming murder?" He took a bite of his burger and I started to chow down as well, speaking in between bites.

"Well we're pretty sure." I had to be careful about what I said to him, considering he wasn't on the force. "It's looking like there couldn't be any other option there. Maybe an animal attack, but it's not likely."

He mulled it over. "Got any leads? I mean if it looks like it's an animal attack then that means you should be able to figure out which animal it was. That would narrow it down."

I shrugged. "I'm fairly certain it was a dog attack, considering how the body looked. Could be bear, but we don't have any of those out here. Not like you're gonna see a black bear strolling through downtown."

He nodded. "Makes sense. Can you do any sort of… NCIS style stuff and figure out what breed of dog it is?"

I rolled my eyes "Don't make me regret showing you that show Alex. And yeah sure, we found some fur and what not on a cactus not too far away from the body."

"How do you know it belonged to the animal that did it?"

"Well it was in an area absolutely slathered in blood, so it's only safe to assume that there's a correlation there."

"That makes sense I suppose." He gave me a bit of a weird look and I raised a brow.

"What's up Alex? You're looking at me weird."

He blinked a few times. "Oh… nothing. Just… be safe, when you go back out Okay? This sounds like it could be really dangerous if you don't play your cards right… you know what's out there."

I sighed and leaned my head against the back of the couch. "I knooow Alex, don't worry about me man I'll be okay." I looked at him. "I'm not completely defenseless I've got my gun."

He looked worried "Yeah but something tells me that a gun won't be enough to help you with everything you could face. I mean a dead body eaten by an animal means that someone out there is pretty messed up, to say the very least. Just… keep yourself safe okay?"

He did this, from time to time. These moments where it felt like he knew more than he let on. It was something I let slide most times, because it didn't seem that important, but there was definitely something about Alex that intrigued me. He even had an odd scent, though it wasn't unpleasant.

"I'll do my best Alex, don't worry. I've got a few tricks up my sleeve."

"You talk about these tricks a fair bit. What actually are they?"

"If I told you, they wouldn't be tricks, or hidden up my sleeve would they?"

He took a bite and thought on that. "I guess you're right on that…"

We sat in silence for a few moments, me thinking about the case and him… well I couldn't begin to guess what was on his mind. After a while, I decided to break the silence.

"So you on break? Kinda early for it isn't it?"

He blinked a few times at me before understanding crossed his face, and he gave a small laugh. It was honestly kinda cute. "Oh no. It's just slow right now so Mr. O'Leary told me to come up here and make sure you were okay. Said you looked upset."

"Aww such a humanitarian." I really did appreciate Mr. O'Leary, especially when you considered what he was. Fae didn't normally like interacting with humans, but he was a pretty chill guy. We had an agreement that I kept his secret and protected him from mortals and supernatural alike, and he let me stay here for a minimal amount of rent. It was a pretty sweet deal, and one that made it easy to keep up my end of the bargain. "Let him know I'm alright, and he doesn't have to worry about me as much as he does. Same thing I told you, I'll be alright."

He sighed "alright Moony. I'll take your word for it for now, but if I find out you got killed I'm gonna be awfully upset with ya." He gave me a small smile and I softened a bit.

"Yeah yeah…" I crossed my arms. "Fine. I'll watch out and take some extra precautions. Wouldn't want you to be upset with my ghost or anything."

"Good, and if you need me for anything" he grabbed his notepad from his pants pocket and wrote something down before sliding it to me. "Give me a call. I'll pick up, I promise."

I nodded and looked over the paper. He had very beautiful writing, I had to admit, before shoving it into my pocket. "Alright. Will do, though I'm not sure how much you can help on this one mate."

"Emotional support is just as important as physical backup." He stood up and took both of the plates to the kitchen, rinsing them off before coming back over. "I gotta head back, but ill catch you in a bit. Let me know how the hunt goes." He gave me a sly smile before leaving with a "taa for now" and disappearing.

I sat there for a few moments thinking about what we had found out, and realizing that he was right. Dealing with normal psychopaths? No problem. Dealing with supernatural entities, even if I was a part of that group was a bit more challenging. I'd have to go in prepared. Luckily for me, I still had 5 hours to do exactly that.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien decides to get a bit of help from the witchy community

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late upload on this one guys! I've had it written up for a while now I just... forgot to actually... You know... Post it.

Shower done and gun loaded I was ready to head out to the witch. Witches were a tricky business, and on a general basis I tried to avoid them at all cost. For normal people, and even other witches, wizards, druids etc all a witch needed was a little bit of hair from you to do whatever the hell he or she wanted you to do, or at the very least turn you inside out. 

I had an advantage of being a werewolf, magic worked in weird ways around us. Sure we could still be set on fire or whatever, but rituals took more effort and a lot of power behind them to affect us. It’s why the smell of magic made me nervous. It wasn’t werewolf magic, so what the hell was it, who was putting out that much magic, and what the hell were they doing with it? Something was itching at the back of my mind that maybe this may not be a cut and dry case, but at the current moment, I had to take things one step at a time.

I spent about 10 minutes trying to find a parking spot on fourth. Downtown was hell enough, fourth was even worse. Being right next to a highschool meant that I had to deal with the usual traffic issues as well as students ditching class and wondering around. On a general basis, I did my best to avoid fourth avenue and downtown in general during the day. It was just a hassle that left me having to park way too far away for comfort. It was the middle of may, at the hottest part of the day, and I was part dog. Walking around in this heat was not at all good for me.

But alas I’m a detective of the people and this needed to be done. I grabbed the bag from my passenger side and threw it into a grocery bag, got out of my car and started walking.

Fourth Avenue, as much as I hated coming down here if I could help it, was an absolutely wonderful mix of culture in Tucson. I always saw it as the baby version of Montmartre, the art district in France, though I suppose that was a bit overstating the area. Regardless, there were wonderful little shops and restaurants, there were murals all over the place and even the crosswalk decided to join in with the festivities by being all the colours of the rainbow. If you took out the overcrowding, the difficult parking and the heat it would actually be a place I’d like to hang out, as it stood it was a place I didn’t hate to be found in, but wouldn’t go on my own.

It didn’t take long for me to reach Celestial Rites, a nice little store that sold everything from Tarot cards to incense to old school magical books. I’ve been in there a few times, since the one that ran the store most of the time was an old friend from high school. I don’t think I had ever bought anything from there, however. I don’t think I could stand the mixture of smells being in my house, and I couldn’t separate them enough when I was in the place to find one that I truly liked.

I put my hand on the door, about to go in, when I was pushed back by someone leaving. It was some angry looking kid, in his early 20s, with dark bags under his eyes and an angry expression on his face. I was honestly surprised he wasn’t wearing a My Chemical Romance or a Slayer shirt, he looked like the kind of kid you’d see in the back of the class listening to 21 pilots and writing in his journal about all the dark and edgy things that he supposedly felt in his heart. He had a huge bag in his hands and looked in a bit of a rush, but not so much of a rush that he didn’t have the time to treat me with a death glare.

I’ll admit, my anger flared a bit. “Hey kid, watch where you’re going.” I growled. He looked up at me and sneered.

“Fuck off, dickturd.”

I was so shocked by being called dickturd that, honestly, I just let him go. I probably shouldn’t have, but what do you do in that situation? Even my wolf was absolutely fucking confused. I’d have to file that one away for future use, maybe on John?

I shook my head and walked in, fully and loudly announcing my presence. “Yo! Trina! You around or am I gonna have to go sniffin you out?!”

I heard a disgruntled sigh coming from the back room. “Nah I’m here Wulfe, come in.” A moment later my witchy friend stepped out from the shadows, carrying some extra merchandise, maybe to replace what the kid had bought? I had no clue. Not my problem.

She was short, 4’8”, but don’t ever mention that to her, with long black hair, black t-shirt combat boots and dark coloured bracelets on her wrists. She was kinda the epitome of a punk-rocker when you really thought about it. In other words, a surprisingly good representation of what a modern day witch might look like.

“Kid looked sketchy, sure you should be selling to someone like that?”

She shrugged and started stocking up items. “Eh. He doesn’t have anything to him. Just some stupid guy who’s trying to be more than he actually is and pretending he’s doing something.”

“Would that not make him… Somehow… More dangerous?” I raised an eyebrow.

“You’d think that, but the leaders of our coven are keeping an eye on things. I’m sure if something was truly going south they’d take care of it.”

I leaned against the counter and picked up a stone, turning it over in my hands idly. “And you’re sure that there’s nothing weird going on?”

She shrugged “I dunno man. I heard something about a murder last night? But as far as I know there’s nothing there that should concern me so I’m not too terribly worried about it. There are other people taking care of it.”

I sighed “Well you’re about to be a part of it I’ll tell you that much.”

She stood up fully and turned on me. “No.”

“What?”

She took a step towards me. “You heard me. No. Look the last time I helped you out on a case I got seriously hurt from it. I’m not doing that again.”

That was… alarming. I wasn’t liking how many times I was getting caught off guard today. Maybe I did need to like… meditate to calm down or something.   
  
_ No, Don’t do that. That’s stupid. _

My wolf, while rude, was probably right. Meditation didn’t work for me. “Look, Trina, that wasn’t my fault it was something completely unrelated.”

“No, it significantly wasn’t. You come up to me and go “Oh hey I’m hunting down some vampires that killed a dude off speedway” and then the next day I’ve got a damn blood slut trying to rip out my hair and bash my face in? I don’t think so. There’s no way that that’s a coincidence.”

“Yeah okay but I took care of that, you’re under protection now.”

“You mean the wolves that on occasion come in, look around my shop for a couple of seconds then leave without buying anything? You know how annoying that gets right? You’ve got like… One person in your pack that I actually like.”

I rolled my eyes. “It’s not my pack, and besides what do you expect? Werewolves don’t tend to enjoy magical stuff, even if some of this stuff is just out here for show.” I put down the rock and put my hands in my pockets. “Again, I’m doing my best, and I don’t see any way that this could blow back on you.”

“Oh I don’t know Wulfe, Maybe a bunch of angry wolves destroying my place, or vampires coming back here, or any other millions of things that could go wrong?”

I sighed. “Look I just need you to give me a way to track this wolf. I can tell he’s new, if he’s left unchecked who knows who else could die.”

“Sounds like a significant amount of not my problem, and an even bigger amount of definitely your wolfy ass problem.”

I growled and threw up my hands in anger, then thought on it for a second, glaring at her back as she turned to stock, then a slow wolfish grin spread across my face. “I can pay.”

That made her stop. It was a bit of a low blow, I knew that she had a weakness for money. Mostly because she had spent a lot of time not having any. “Could you really this time?”

I shrugged. “Sure. I’ve been saving up and you’d be doing me a service.”

She sighed and stood up fully before storming off into the back room. I blinked and watched her go for a minute before hearing a sharp “Well? Come on then!”

_ Money can be exchanged for goods and services. _

I ignored him and trudged into the backroom. It was… completely different from the light open front area, though I guess there was less windows so that wasn’t too difficult to get behind. There were candles everywhere that were making my nose wrinkle and random trinkets and boxes laying about. She took me to a separate room and pushed me into a chair, then glared at me.

“You’ve got the DNA I imagine?”

I nodded and threw the bag onto the table. She took the evidence bag out of it and raised an eyebrow.

“You have permission to have this right? Don’t need the police on me as well…”

“I have permission, I promise you that.”

She nodded “Alright good. Money first, then I’ll give you a tracker.”

I rolled my eyes but reached into my pocket and pulled out a couple hundred bucks, throwing that on the table as well. She picked it up and pocketed it immediately. “Wait here, and don’t fucking touch anything. My boss will kill me if she found out I let a werewolf back here and he stole something.”

I put my hands on the table where she could see them and nodded. “You got it hoss, I’ll keep my fingers clean.”

It was… boring. It was incredibly boring. Practically mind numbing. After a while of sitting there I decided to pull out my phone and add Alex’s number to my contacts.

“Hey Alex, It’s Damien. Figured you should have my number too, save it into your contacts.”

“For sure! Happy to have it. How goes the hunting?”

“Eh stuck in a shop for now. How’s work?”

“Same old same old, nothing new. A shop?”

“Yeah, I’m wondering if it’ll give me a lead. Got a good tracker friend here so I was hoping she’d be willing to help me out with it."

"Oooh big strong detective calling in some back up? Didn't take you for the type."

"Well ya know. Can't do everything on my own, as much as I'd hate to admit it, there are others who have skills where mine fall short."

"That makes sense. Hey it's getting pretty busy here, I'll have to catch up with you later, but give me all the details you can when you're done."

"You know I can't do that, but I will talk to you later, if that helps."

"I suppose that works for now. Later Moony :)"

I sighed. I hated that name. Where Alex was concerned, it was a reference to a character I had made back in middles chool that I had, mistakingly, told him about. The way he said it though, it was both endearing and, again, like he knew more than he let on and that made me uneasy. It was probably nothing, but still… maybe I should talk to him about it someday.

Trina came back out a little later looking tired and holding a necklace, a yellow looking gem with a blood red core on it with what looked to be fur wound around it. She tossed it to me and I caught it pretty easily.

“There. Tracking you wolves is impossible.”

“But I’m assuming you did it?”

“Won’t know till you try it. Just put some energy into it and it should lead you to where you need to go.”

“Should I go in prepared, guns blazing? Or… Fangs bared I guess?”

“Hell if I know dude. I’m not an oracle I’m a witch.”

I sighed “Yeah okay I suppose. I’m just kinda wondering what I should expect. If this is a pack then I should definitely not going in, if it’s a lone wolf then I can easily outweigh them.”

“I don’t know. What I do know is that you need to skedaddle before you attract unwanted attention.”

“I don’t think that I would-”

“Nope. Out. Gone. Out with ye get out come on.” She reached over and grabbed a newspaper, rolling it up and waving it at me. “Don’t make me use this.”

I growled, but stood up. “Okay that’s just rude and insensitive and my feelings are hurt.”

“You don’t have feelings to hurt now out. Go do your detective shit.” She whapped me on the shoulder and I grumbled, threatening to eat the newspaper before trudging out.

_ That was rude. She didn’t have to bring the news into this. It’s unnecessary. _

“I know. Believe me I know.”

_ You should go and give her a piece of your mind. _

“We’ve got work to do. Not right now.”

_ But… But she was being a bitch. _

“Hey, watch the language. And no, she wasn’t. She was defending her territory, that’s something you should understand better than anyone else.”

_ Fine… Still… If she thinks you’re that much like a common house dog maybe you should go and eat her shoes. _

I snickered a bit. “I don’t think I like the taste of feet and dirt enough to do that.”

_ Pee on her couch? _

“That would require me to not only get into her house but also to not find it incredibly weird to pee on someone’s property.”

_ I’ll think of something, just you wait. _

“Look at me, not holding my breath.”

Sometimes, my wolf wasn’t so bad.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien is not good with most types of magic that don't involve being a wolf...

“Okay… Put some energy into it and let it guide me huh?” I sighed and flicked the gem. It swung back and forth on my rearview mirror. I had been trying for a while and nothing seemed to be happening. Now I was sitting outside my apartment glaring at it.

_ I don’t think that you’re exactly suited to do this particular part on your own. _

“Oh shut up. I can do this on my own. I just… have to… figure out how…”

_ I truly find it amazing that in the 11 years of you doing this you have never once figured out how to focus energy. _

“Oh well since you’re the fuckin genius on the subject why don’t you tell me?” Conversations like this were always weird, since they were basically me just arguing with myself, but a different part of my brain. It really was two separate but same personalities. Regardless, I was glad no one could hear me right now… they might think I was insane or something.

_ I am not the expert, nor do I have any fucking clue on how to direct energy. I’m just surprised you haven’t taken the effort to learn how to. _

“Why the hell would I need to? I’m not a witch, I can control the change and stay in control when I was changed. That’s pretty much the extent of what I needed to learn.”

_ Even still. Might have helped out in this situation. It’s called Forward thinking Damien, you should embrace it. _

I gritted my teeth “Yeah well maybe you should just go fuck your-”

There was a tap on my passenger side window and I glared over, my expression softening when I saw that it was Alex, with two to go cups of milkshakes, one strawberry, one chocolate. I rolled my eyes and unlocked the door. He responded by opening the door up and hopping in.

“Hey Moony. Saw you sitting in here talking to yourself and staring at a necklace, figured you’d want something to drink.” He held up the milkshakes. “Which do you want?”

My response was immediate. “Strawberry, can’t eat chocolate.”

_ That’s not entirely true, we just don’t know if you can eat chocolate. _

Alex chuckled at that. “You know, I did always say that you were like a dog, maybe a Labrador retriever or something along those lines.”

I took the milkshake and grumbled a bit before sipping on it. It was actually really good, but I was in a mood and that mood made me want to be argumentative. “Wait… You’ve never once said that to me.”

He blinked and blushed a bit, looking down at his cup. “Oh you know… I mean… If I needed to talk about you to anyone… That was just the descriptor I used.”

“Who would you have needed to talk about me to?” I quirked an eyebrow. “I can’t see me coming up much in conversation where you’re concerned.”

“Well you’re my friend, of course you’d come up in conversation.” He took a sip “I mean… I’d call us friends, wouldn’t you?”

I thought on that for a second. I always kind of figured he thought of me as the asshole that lives above where he works, though I had thought of him as a friend I didn’t know that was mutual.

_ He brings you food every week, people don’t do that for just some random asshole, dickturd. _

I snickered a bit at that. Too soon. “Yeah… I guess I’d consider us friends.” I sighed and then looked at him. “So spill it, Alex, who you been talking to about me?”

His blush reddened. “My… My mom.”

I snorted a bit, then immediately felt bad. He was serious! That was so crazy! “Really? You talk to your mom about me?”

He pouted and looked at me. “Well yes! She’s important to me and likes to know who I’m hanging out with. You happen to be that person.”

“That person huh?” I was suddenly piecing a lot of things together. Maybe that ‘something more’ to Alex I was picking up wasn’t anything magical at all, but just who he was? “Shouldn’t it be ‘one of those people’?”

He shrugged and went back to his drink. “Meh. Not really. I don’t really hang out with anyone else. Between work and my… uh… Extra Curricular activities I don’t have a whole hell of a lot of time for going out or anything.”

I blinked and felt a pang of guilt. Well damn. I looked down at my drink, then put a hand on his shoulder. It was awkward but whatever. Something told me he needed it. “Well hey, I’m more than okay with calling you a friend, and you can tell your mom about me all you want, even if there isn’t much there to tell.”

He looked up at me and smiled a bit. It physically hurt to see him so… vulnerable.

_ He’s gonna die on his own Damien, You should probably keep an eye out for this pup. Don’t you agree? _

Yeah… That was probably smart.

“Thanks Moony. I appreciate that.” We held eye contact for a bit longer than was normal before he snapped away and looked at the necklace. “So… What’s so special about this thing?” There was a glint in his eye and my suspicions returned. This guy was a damn enigma and that pissed me off.

“It’s a gift from a friend. Supposedly it’s supposed to like… help me on my way or my journey or whatever but I have no clue how the fuck it’s supposed to do that.”

“Now Damien, is there someone else out there trying to get you to calm the fuck down?”

I glared at him. “No, I’ve got plenty of people doing that I don’t need another. It’s just some stupid necklace, nothing much to say about it.”

He shrugged and took it off the rearview, looking at it. He held it up in his hand, looking at the stone at eye level. He put his milkshake in between his legs and held his free hand under the stone. Clearly he had a reverence for stones, learning something else.

“The cut of it and the colour suggests it’s a rutilated quartz, though the red in the center is a bit unusual.”

I blinked. “You can tell that just from looking at it?”

He shrugged “My mom’s something of a geology nerd. She passed the trait onto me. You know…” he looked over at me with a smirk. “Some people believe that this crystal is meant to show you the bigger picture, clear a path to your end goal or something like that.” he looked back at the gem. “Though that’s just a bunch of magical mumbo jumbo. Not like that stuff is real or anything.”

“I… did not know that actually. Though it is interesting.”

“Well, belief is what you make of it.” he put the necklace back over the rearview and smiled. “Alright Damien, I’m gonna leave you to your muttering, but you stay safe okay?”

I nodded, a little shocked at him. So I had learned two things about him, he liked rocks and he didn’t believe in magic. Something still felt off about it, but I wasn’t going to argue for now. I was too tired and frustrated. I still had to figure out how to get this stupid gem to work. He might not believe in magic, but I knew for a fact that it was real, and this necklace was supposed to be the magic that led me to the killer. I nodded, staring at it. “Sure thing, bud. I’ll stay safe no worries.”

He patted my shoulder and I felt a swirling in the pit of my stomach. That was weird. I chose to ignore it as I watched him get out of the car and make his way back to the restaurant. I sighed and flicked the necklace again. “Come on. Do something.”

It just swung around, taunting me. I put my head on the steering wheel and growled. “This is fucking stupid.”

_ Maybe she lied to you. Did you just get swindled for 300 dollars? I think you did. You should go back and tear up her curtains. _

“That’s cats, not dogs... “ I blinked when a familiar scent hit my nose. “Wait what?” I looked up and the scent of magic got stronger. I looked at the necklace. It had stopped swinging back in forth.

As a matter of fact it stopped moving all together, now suspended at a 90 degree angle off to the west. “Well I’ll be a Pomeranian's uncle.”

_ Hot damn. Look Damien, your bitching made it work! _

“I doubt that was it. Come on let’s go.”

_ I’m kinda stuck going wherever you go, so lead the way. _

He had a point. I grabbed the necklace and my milkshake, turned off the car, hopped out and started walking.

________

We had been walking for a good while. Luckily, it wasn’t too terribly hot now, seeing as how it was later in the day. Also lucky for me was that it took a lot to actually make me tired. The Necklace seemed to be taking me to an area of town I didn’t often go into. For starters, it was a part of town that I didn’t like. It smelled of diesel fuel and desperation for a better life. The people here were stuck in an industrial hellscape of having to wake up every day, go to work, go to bed and wake up just to do the same thing over and over. Minimum wage workers with nowhere else to go. I wish I could change it, but there really wasn’t anything I could do at this current moment.

The other problem was that this area absolutely reeked of the undead. The people that lived around these areas or worked around here probably wouldn’t be able to tell, but there were vampires all over the goddamned place. My best guess for that was that there were enough people willing to give their lives to something stupid here that it made them the perfect prey. I hated being in this area.

In case you couldn’t tell, vampires and werewolves didn’t often get along, especially in this town. We had an understanding, you don’t jump into our territory, we don’t go into yours. We tried to keep ourselves away from them, and when they did make the mistake of stepping foot in our roaming grounds, which consisted of just about everywhere north of Irvington road, we made sure they never made that mistake again.

Naturally this made me wonder if I should maybe call up my mom and have some back up, but that just… was a bad idea. I was going into the vamp territory… as the sun was setting, to go and find a werewolf. This was already a bad idea but if I brought in another wolf they’d probably see it as an act of aggression. At least like this I could go through on diplomatic immunity, especially since… again… I was on the outside of the pack in the first place.

I sighed and continued trudging towards my goal, not that I knew entirely what that was.

_ Hey, Damien. You smell that? _

I blinked and sniffed the air, then immediately recoiled. “Ugh… yes. It smells like death, why would you make me do that?”

_ Not the death you dolt. The dog. _

I blinked and took another sniff. Sure enough, there was the faint smell of dog in the air. “That must mean we’re close.”

_ You’re damn straight it does. Let’s go, pick up the pace. _

I mumbled something under my breath but picked up the pace. As a werewolf I was naturally fast, not as fast I was in my wolf form, but I could still haul ass if I so desired, and this was one of those moments where I very much so mattered. I followed my nose and the necklace to a run down house off a dirt path. I stopped at a safe distance and crouched down, pocketing the necklace after confirming that that’s where it was pointing.

“Okay Wolf, this is it. Do you think we should go in peacefully or try and break in and get down there?”

_ I’m always a sucker for a good bloodshed. _

“Okay, I’d rather not have a bloodshed, since that could cause a war and I don’t want that either.”

_ I think it could be fun. _

“Yeah well I don’t. Let’s try the sneaky route.” I sighed and started to make my way around the house. There was only one light on in the house, and unfortunately for me it was up on the second floor. I sighed and looked around. There had to be a way up there that wouldn’t be absolutely hell or loud as fuck. Unfortunately, there was no convenient vine or nearby tree, so I’d have to do this the difficult way.

_ I think you mean the fun way. _

“Shut up.” I sighed and looked at the patio of the house, then the trim above it. With a sigh I climbed up the side of the patio, outside of eyesight of the door. I reached up and tested the edge of the trim by pulling it a bit. It had a small amount of give, but in theory it would do. I put both hands up there, jumped up and started pulling myself up, swinging a leg up and rolling over to lay on my back, staring up at the sky. I didn’t want to look down. Looking down only confirmed that I was up higher than I was supposed to be and I didn’t like that.

_ Still haven’t gotten over your fear of your heights have you? _

“I said shut up,” I hissed. “And it’s not a fear of heights it’s a fear of falling.” I shuddered a bit and steadied myself on the roof, then made my way over to the window with the light. I wasn’t sure what I’d see in there. Vampires didn’t tend to need light, not a lot of it anyways, so why was the light on in the first place? I sniffed the air and my nose wrinkled again, but the smell of dog was definitely stronger in this area than in any other. I raised an eyebrow and peaked into the window, hoping that I wouldn’t get seen. That’d be a bad thing.

The room was pretty standard. Run down, for sure, but not the worst. There was actually a bed in the dim yellow glow of the light, with a desk tucked off into the corner and a dresser next to the window. There were toys thrown hastily around, dusted and discarded. The part of it that was unusual, at least for me, was the individual sitting in the room, crying in the corner, and obviously scared. He had tanned skin, with untamed black hair that seemed to go everywhere, chubby cheeks and bright green, albeit bloodshot eyes.

He was also about 12, so there was that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you guys are enjoying this so far, even with my semi-sporadic uploading schedule. I'm actually up to chapter 10 on this outside of archive of our own? I just need to remember to actually... You know... Upload it.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like putting these up at night, that way you guys have it in the morning, if that makes any sense. If you guys want me to do it earlier or later let me know and I'll do my best.

There was no way that this kid could be the murderer. See werewolves didn’t start turning until puberty. I don’t know why it happens like that, but it does. For me it was on my 17th birthday, I was a late bloomer, but even still. When puberty hit, so does the change. I think it’s supposed to be some cruel joke by the fates to force us through actual hell by giving us the two hardest changes we will ever go through in our lives.

Though I suppose there was the chance that he was turned by another werewolf, that was still a possibility, though less likely. I’d need to get a closer look at the kid. There were certain signs that made it obvious that you were turned by being bitten or attacked by another werewolf, usually scar marks that represent a mauling. It was rare, and most people didn’t survive the attack much less the change, but it was possible.

Unfortunately, I didn't have any other answer. The necklace was pointing right at him. Unless something was wrong with the enchantment, that was some pretty solid proof right there.

I was about to open the window and get the kid out when I heard talking in a different window. I sighed and shifted my weight over the roof to another window.

“-don’t understand why we have to watch this kid, and I’m getting sick of my nose being clogged by wet dog.” The voice was heavily British, and a large amount of snob. I already hated this guy and I didn’t even have to see him.

“We’re watching the kid because the kid can be beneficial to us. Or rather, he can be beneficial, the kid is a method to accomplish our goals.” This one sounded like a Chicago mafia member. I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t believe that I was basically listening to a godfather impressionist.

“You do know that we don’t need them to do that, we can just take them out and not have to worry about it.”

“We don’t have enough people to do that. We’d have to get every single clan involved to get it done, and that’s just impossible.”

“Are you sure? I’m sure a lot of them would be more than happy to take out those stupid ass hounds. It wouldn’t be that ha-”

I winced as I heard and felt the first voice get slammed against the wall. That was… not good. I was suddenly reaffirming the thought that maybe this was a bit bigger than I initially thought.

“Listen. There is no way we can get every vamp here to take out the hounds. If we could, then we would have, and we would have won easily. But the wolves have formed some sort of fucked up alliance with a lot of the different clans, and now we have to deal with that bullshit. That being said, if we help Zackarias out then we don’t have to worry about that. We’ll have our own army to take them out, then we get our territories back, capiche?”

I gulped. I’d have to talk to my mom about this, it’s something she should know. I moved back to the kid’s window, my mission suddenly becoming a hell of a lot more urgent. It took me a second to jimmy the window open and sneak my way in. I held my hands out towards the kid when he looked up, then put my finger on my lips. From there, I spoke extremely softly. If he actually was a werewolf, then he could hear me, I just didn’t want to risk anyone else hearing me.

“Alright kid… don’t freak out… We need to get you out of here. Come on.”

The kid, scared as hell, just sort of nodded at me and stood up. I think he was too far into shock to actually argue. I could only imagine what he had been through since he got here. I took his hand and led him to the window, trying to be as kind and unthreatening as I could be. We made our way out of the window and I led to the kid to the edge. Looking down I sighed, I hated heights, even small ones like this one. “Here, hop on and hold on.” I reached down and picked up the kid, slinging him over my back. “Hold on tight, don’t let go.” He nodded and wrapped his arms around my neck, grabbing onto his own arms in front. I adjusted him slightly before crouching down and swinging around to be hanging on the edge. When I did, I heard the door open in the room and shouts of alarm. “Fuck…” I dropped down. “Alright kid we gotta go right now.” I swung him around and held him in a scooby doo carry before breaking out in a full sprint. We had to leave, immediately.

Why the fuck didn’t I bring my car?

I growled and dodged around streetlights and fire hydrants. I could feel my pursuers behind me. I was fast, when I was a human, but I wasn’t fast enough to outrun certain vampires. They had this ability… and some stupid name for it that I couldn’t remember right now, but that ability made them fast as fuck. They were essentially the Usain Bolt of the vampiric world. I was hoping against all hope that they didn’t have anyone that had that ability, but I knew that my chances of that weren’t exactly high.

I realized that I would need to take some drastic efforts, and that made me nervous. My eyes darted around until I found what I was looking for, an alleyway with a full dumpster, and ducked into it.

“Alright kid I need you to do something and it’s going to sound weird.”

He looked up at me, then looked to the street. I’d argue that he was even more scared than he had been before.

I sighed. I didn’t know how to deal with a scared kid. That being said, I did know how to get adults into gear, and that couldn’t be too difficult. I knelt down and put my hands on his shoulder. “Look, kid. I’ll get you out of here. I promise you that, you will get out of this and you will get out of here alive, but for now I need you to buck up and show me that fighter spirit that I can tell is in there.” He looked me in the eyes and nodded, wiping his face of tears.

“I can tell you’ve got a lot of fight in there. Now use that fight to work with me and fight that fear that’s inside you. Or hell, use that fear to push you forward so we can get out of here and be safe. Now take a few breaths, calm down, and show me that war face.”

He did as I said, taking a few breaths. Then, he furrowed his brow, got an incredibly determined look on his face, and looked up at me. “O-Okay.”

I blinked. “Holy shit you can talk.” I smiled. “That’s the spirit. Okay so here’s what I need you to do.” I stood up and transferred my phone and keys from my pants pockets to my jacket pocket, as well as the necklace. I pulled out Alex’s phone number and looked at it for a second, then pocketed that one too. I then took off the jacket and wrapped it around the kid’s shoulders. It was… way too big for him but that was okay. “Put your arms through there and zip it up okay? Once you’re done with that, turn around and when I give you the signal, don’t ask any questions, just climb on my back, hold on, and we’ll get the hell out of here.”

He nodded and put his arms through the jacket. It was… actually kind of adorable, if I was being perfectly honest, then zipped it up and turned around.

I did the only thing that made sense for now. I initiated the change.

When I needed to, I could make the change fast. It hurt more, but it was convenient. The only thing that truly bugged me was my clothes ripping. I’d need new boots at this point. When I had finished out the change, I padded over and nudged the kid’s elbow with my nose. He jumped a bit then turned towards me. His eyes widened. “Y-you… you’re a wolf?!”

I nodded, then gestured for him to get on and lowered my head down so he wouldn’t have to climb much. He clambered on and I could feel his hands grab onto the nape of my neck, holding on tight. It was moments like these when I was glad that wolves had that extra skin back there. It was also moments like this when I was really glad I was the size of a small horse. This would have been difficult otherwise.

I gave the dog version of a smirk before taking off at full speed. As a human, I couldn’t keep up with a vampire, but as a wolf? We were born to hunt, and we were born to hunt vampires. Even the ones with a proficiency in going fast weren’t able to outrun us.

Though there was a part of me that had to admit that I really liked running fast, and that definitely was a reason for wanting to do this. I could tell the kid was still scared, but was starting to have fun himself, if that was the right reaction to a situation like this. I imagined that this was the fastest the kid had ever gone.

As soon as we crossed the threshold of the vamp territory I actively relaxed. I could feel my muscles easing and the tension in my shoulders melt away. I slowed down a bit and moved to being at a simple run, rather than a sprint. It was still pretty fast… but it wasn’t as mind blowing as how I was going.

“S-So… Mr. Wolf?”

My ears perked up and I looked over my shoulder as much as I could, which wasn’t much, just to show him that I was paying attention before looking forward again.

“Those were vampires… which are real… right?”

I nodded

“And you’re a werewolf… which is also real.”

Another nod. This would have been easier if I could actually speak out loud.

“I wonder what else is real…”

I couldn’t shrug, but if I could have I would have. I remember finding out all this stuff was real and how I felt about it. There was a lot of conflicting feelings. Suddenly everything you’ve spent your entire life reading about in mythos and stories is completely real to you and you have to process that in the matter of seconds, otherwise get eaten alive. I could understand his fear, relate to it even.

There was a new smell in the air and I raised an eyebrow at it. Magic, in a major way. I had smelled powerful magic but this was the kind that made my nose burn, and made my fur stand on edge. The kid grabbed on tighter and I stopped, turning to look back where we came from as a fireball fell from the sky, landing on a building in the distance with a massive explosion. I gulped, whatever had caused that was powerful as hell, and that worried the shit out of me. Whatever threw that was not something I wanted to deal with.

The kid winced as he watched the smoke rise.

“Um… Mr. Wolf?” He said after a minute.

I made a small noise.

“What was that?”

I shrugged a shoulder. Of course I knew a little bit, but I couldn’t exactly answer.

“Do you think we should… uh… Maybe run?” I blinked. Oh. Right… That was a thing that we should be doing. The kid was smart… Or at least had a valuable natural instinct for self preservation. I took his advice and started running again.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien and Marcus go to the park

I didn't have very many options as to where I could go. I could, theoretically, bring the kid to my place, but that could present some issues in the future. I could take him to the police station but that might freak out the kid. I guessed I could take him to John, but that might have been awkward too, considering that I'd only ever been to his place once.

So naturally I did the one thing I could think of. I ran off towards the restaurant. When we got there I put the kid down, then put my paw on the jacket pocket, and then on the door. I waited patiently as he pulled my keys out of the pocket and found the right one for the door. He opened it up and I trudged in after him, giving him time to lock the door again. I then went to a chair, bit the leg and pulled it out, before patting it. He obliged, sitting on the chair and putting the keys on the table. I leaned forward, nabbed the keys in between my teeth and trotted off up the stairs. When I got there I put the keys on the ground and changed back to human.

"That… sucks I hate having to communicate as a wolf."

_ I'm surprised you're not used to it at this point. _

"I am, but that doesn't change the fact that I hate it." I sighed and went into my apartment, getting a new change of clothes and throwing on some sneakers. I was still upset at my distinct lack of boots.

When I was sufficiently pleased with my appearance I went back down stairs, locking my door behind me and making my way to the dining room.

"Alright kid…" I blinked. I couldn't keep calling him kid. That was just… mean. "First off, what's your name?"

He blinked "uh… Marcus Mr. Wolf."

I nodded "Damien Wulfe. Pleasure to meet you."

"Wait… your name is actually Wolf?"

I sighed and rubbed my temple. "Yeah. But it's not like… w-o-l-f it's w-u-l-f-e. It's my dad's name and before you say anything he isn't a werewolf so don't worry about it."

"Oh… okay. I think it's pretty cool though."

I nodded "Thank you. So Marcus, next point of business. We need to get you someplace safe. You got a family?"

He looked at me then looked down. "Uh… Nah. My parents kinda… passed… not too long ago."

I felt a pang of sympathy for the kid. That was rough, to say the least. "Well shit okay. Next question. Do you know why you absolutely reek of magic?" It was obscured when we were in the vampire hideout, and even more so when the fireball was dropped on what I assumed was the very same vampire hideout, but now I could smell the same faint traces of magic on him that I had smelled in the warehouse.

He shrugged in response "I'm not sure. I just know my nose has been burning since this morning. I didn't know that was magic though…"

"Alright, that makes sense. Let me see my phone."

He reached into the pocket and held up my phone. I took it and smiled "thanks Marcus." I searched through my contacts and hit the call button.

Trina picked up after a few rings. "Damien I swear to fuckin god if you're asking me to make you another tracking necklace I will personally take out your eyeballs and put your balls in their place."

"Well okay graphic but no that's not what I was going to ask. I found the wolf… or… rather the pup."

"Oh! So it worked? Wait why pup?"

"Yes it did, and the wolf is a kid, I'd be surprised if he was older than 12." I looked at Marcus, who was playing with his hands.

"Jesus. I thought that was impossible…"

"Yeah well so did I. Here's the thing, kid doesn't seem to have any scars on him so he's a born lycanthrope, and he smells of magic. Any idea what that could mean?"

There was silence and the sound of a mug being set on a counter. "Hmm… I dunno. But I know someone who might, if you're willing to deal with him."

"Oh? How would he know?"

"Well for starters he's one of the higher ups in our coven, but aside from that he specializes in werewolves. If there was anyone that would know of weird werewolf voodoo, it's be him."

"Oh, well that makes sense. Where do I meet him?"

She thought about it. "Reid park would be the best place at this time of night."

That made me shudder. "You want me… to go to Reid park, at night, with a kid? Do you realize how stupid that is?"

"Okay yeah it's like a center point for bad shit at night, but you're a big bulking werewolf, and he's a powerful witch. There's no way that you two could possibly be in danger."

I sighed. "Alright. Tell him to meet me there." I hung up and gestured for Marcus to follow. He got up and stayed close as we headed out to the car.

We drove in silence for a good while, listening to random songs on my playlist as we went. When we got to Some Fantastic by Barenaked Ladies, Marcus finally spoke up.

"So all this magic stuff is real… and I'm somehow caught in the middle of a real bad situation…"

I blinked. The kid was smart, and that was honestly worrisome. "Uh… yeah. Kinda. Look, what do you remember about last night?"

He thought on it. "Not much, I was outside doing… things… and I saw someone with black hair… he did something with his hand and then I woke up in that house. They wouldn't let me leave and I didn't know why."

I sighed "Okay so this guy… any distinct features?"

"No. It was too dark for that. I just remember dark hair."

"That… narrows it down to a large population of Arizona but okay"

He blushed a bit and looked down at his hands "Sorry…"

I looked over at him and gave a small smile "No problem kid. It only makes the hunt more interesting."

“Oh… So wait why are you a part of this?”

“Well for one, I’m a detective. I wanna figure out who made you did this, or rather who put you in place to do this, so that we can take them down.”

“You’re not going to arrest me?”

“Bud, I’m gonna do everything in my power to make sure you don’t end up behind bars.”

He nodded, seeming to relax a bit. “Okay… that’s nice of you.”

“Well, I’m a wolf as well, which is the second reason. Now either someone forced you to be something you weren’t, which doesn’t seem to be the case… Or someone forced you to change before you were ready, which is less likely, but looks to be the only possibility here. Unless you have scars or cuts where I can’t see them?”

He thought on it and poked his stomach a few times. “No… I’ve got a scar on my leg, but other than that my body is fine.”

“Then yeah it’s the second option, I believe.”

He nodded “So… what exactly does that mean?”

“Which part?”

“Forced me to change?”

“Well there are two ways to become a werewolf. I mean you’re forced into it, or its born lycanthrope. You get attacked, undergo a process that is painful as hell and kills most people forced into it, or you have it in your blood and when you hit puberty you wolf out for the first time. Not that everyone who has wolf blood will wolf out, if that were the case then we’d have a hell of a lot more wolves, but that’s the basic gist of it.”

“And you think I was born with it?”

I nodded. “Problem is, you haven’t gone through puberty yet. It’s pretty obvious, sorry kid. So you shouldn’t have wolfed out like you did.”

He looked out the window. “So how is that possible?”

I shrugged “Not sure. I imagine there’s some explanation for it though, and with any luck we’re going to get that explanation tonight.” I yawned and continued driving.

“So… Why Reid Park? I’ve never been there, is it something special?”

My eyes widened. “You’ve never been to Reid Park? Man your childhood could stand to be better, but regardless, Reid park is a centerpoint in Tucson for supernatural entities. The lake itself has an entity that makes sure it’s kept up properly and there’s this big monolith that I’m fairly certain is a portal or gateway for something absolutely horrendous.”

“You’re fairly certain? You’ve never tried it?”

I shook my head. “Look kid, I may be adventurous but I am not stupid. You see a giant monolith that gives you the heeby jeebys and smells like badness all over the damn place, you don’t tend to waltz right into it whistling Dixie.”

I blinked a few times “Whistling Dixie?”

I sighed “Okay I’ve clearly got a few things to teach you. Regardless, not the point. The point is, you have to look out for yourself and be careful, especially as a werewolf. There’s a bunch of nasty shit out there that would love to get it’s hands on you and use you for their own advantage. These are things you have to look out for and guard yourself against.”

“How do you protect yourself?”

I thought on it. “You mean besides being in tune with my wolf and having a police issue gun filled with iron and lead? I’ve got a fae that runs a restaurant under where I live. The supernatural life tends to stay away from them.”

“Oh. What’s a Fae?”

“That… is a loaded question that I will answer for you some other time. For the time being, however, we’re here.” I pulled into the parking lot and sighed. I didn’t want to be here, I hated Reid at night. I had come here a long time ago with John when I was still learning to control my wolf. He had heard reports of some bad kids doing bad things and figured I’d be a good guard for him while he scoped it out. Turns out, a fledgeling wolf won’t do shit against a bunch of shadow people and lake bitches.

I reached into the back seat and grabbed my gun, as well as a knife, hopped out of the car and put them on. “Alright Marcus.” I closed the door and walked around to his side, opening his door. “You’re to stay close to me, don’t move an inch from me unless I tell you to, got it? This isn’t a nice happy times stroll through the park.”

“Got it.” He hopped out of the car and I closed it. “Who are we meeting here?”

“One of the leaders of the local witch coven. Don’t know who they are though.”

“The person you were talking to didn’t give you a name?”

“Nah.”

“Did they tell you what this person looks like?”

“Nah. Don’t worry about that I’ll know who they are when I see them, partially because they’ll be the only ones that smell of powerful magic, and also because they’ll be the only other living beings here. Unless there are some stupid kids still lingering about.”

He nodded “I guess that makes sense.”

I gave Marcus a reassuring pat on the shoulder, or at least one that I was hoping was reassuring. I could tell he was scared, and I was most certainly not pleased by the location, but we had to press on. If we didn't, who knew what could happen. “Let’s go.”

We set off for a bit. Reid park was pretty big park, comparatively. I’m sure there are bigger parks out there, but for now this was the biggest that I had ever seen. Luckily, finding what I was looking for wasn’t that hard. See the thing about tracking Witches is that they almost always leave little signs on where to find them.

So I let my nose guide me. The familiar scent of magic was in the air and it didn’t take much for me to follow it where I needed to go, straight to a swing set. I set Marcus on one of the swings and crossed my arms, scanning the area. There was another familiar scent here, but in my tired mind I couldn’t necessarily place it, which bugged me. Maybe it was just the magic permeating the area that made it difficult, I wasn’t sure. Point being, I don’t like when things are at the edge of my brain and not coming forward.

I heard a twig snap over by the trees skirting the edge of the playground and immediately turned towards it, pulling my gun. I kept my finger off the trigger, if this was our witch I didn’t want to shoot them right off the bat, but I kept it aimed at the area. It wasn’t long before a figure stepped forward from the trees, keeping himself in the shadows, not a hard feat to accomplish since there was no light in this place.

“Oh come now, no need for that level of violence.”

My eye twitched. The voice was all too familiar. “Why don’t you step where I can see you and then I’ll decide whether or not violence is an option.”

“Aww, don’t be like that pup. After all…” he stepped close and my eyes widened as he put his hand on my gun, lowering it and looking up at me with a big smile. “I thought we were friends Moony.”


	8. Chapter 8

I felt my anger flair up. “You lied to me."

"Only once."

"You never told me."

"And you never told me you were a werewolf. I think you're being a bit hypocritical here Damien." He still had that smile on his face, but I could tell he had worry in his eyes. My anger threatened to dissipate and it took everything in my power to not let it.

"I didn't tell you I was a werewolf because as far as I knew you were just a normal human being, and I didnt… no I couldn't pull you into this kind of shit. You, however, knew I was a werewolf and could have told me at any time that you not only were a witch but that you were one of the people running the local coven!"

He sighed and put his hands in his pockets. "I couldn't tell you. I'm not supposed to be known as a witch and my position definitely isn't supposed to be known. If people found out they'd just try to use me. It was safer for both of us for me to not tell you, though I will admit I was hoping you'd sorta… figure it out on your own. For a detective you've got a pretty slow burn."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever" I grumbled and turned to look at Marcus. I was too tired for twists and turns tonight, and too hurt to keep up with my usual banter. Don't get me wrong I didn't expect him to tell me everything but in the few months we had spent with each other I did consider him as a friend, and friends usually shared important details with each other. He could have told me at any time and he didn't, hell even i had considered telling him a few times, but i didn't want him getting wrapped up in the supernatural.

"This is the kid. Marcus. See what you can find out." I walked in front of Marcus to the other side of the set and leaned against the pole, watching them. Alex looked… hurt, but that wasn't my problem right now.

Alex took a deep breath and walked in front of Marcus, giving a soft smile. "Hey buddy. I've gotta figure out what sort of magic is surrounding you Okay? Maybe see what caused all this to happen."

I tuned them out to collect my thoughts a bit. If Alex truly was the head of their coven, then he'd know what to do and didn't need me meddling about in his business. It was a rough thing to process. I thought I knew Alex, but as it turns out he's got this huge secret floating about in his head that he never once let on to. Admittedly I should have picked it up after a little while, but it never occurred to me to even think of it.

_ You're being stupid. You see that, right? _

I blinked and muttered under my breath, so the others couldn't hear me. "I am not, this is a perfectly understandable thing to be upset about."

_ Yes, if you had known him for several years and he never told you. As it stands you've only known him for a few months, dumbass. It makes sense for him to not tell you. _

I grumbled "No. It doesn't. It's my job to watch over the supernatural entities in this town."

_ Oh and you've done such a great fucking job of it, call in the mayor this guy deserves a medal of honour. _

"Shut up. Besides, if we are friends like he claims he would have told me previously. It just makes sense."

_ And why didn't you tell him? _

I blinked at that. "That's different. I didn't know he was magic, and he never let on that he was. If I'd have told him who knows what kind of trouble he could get in."

_ He gave you ample opportunity to figure out that he was a witch. You were simply too much of an asshole to look past your own problems and figure it out. _

"Well what about you huh? If you're just the pinnacle of goodwill and observation why didn't you figure it out?"

_ I had my suspicions, just like you. But with you not digging into it further what was I to do? _

"Maybe tell me to investigate it further without having your snout so far up his ass that not even funny."

_ Oh don't you give me that you never stopped me with that either. _

"Didn't think I had to."

_ Look. Here's what needs to happen. That man over there actually gives a shit about you, for some ungodly reason. I am you, and I fucking hate you at times. Don't lose that by being a crying little piss baby. _

I sighed. "I'll think about it. But for now we've got a job to do."

I was broken out of it by Alex walking up to me, a bit nervous.

_ Look at that, Damien. You're the reason he is nervous. Does that make you feel Good? _

I growled inwardly. My wolf was starting to piss me off. I looked down at alex and raised an eyebrow.

"I… might need to keep him with me for a bit. What he's got on him is wrapped so tightly around who he is that it's not even remotely funny. Trying to undo it here could possibly kill him, or worse."

I nodded. "That makes sense. What do you think it is?"

He sighed "I'm not fully sure, but what I can tell you is that someone has actively manipulated his brain and forced changes that he shouldn't have to go through yet. He's essentially got barbed wire not only over his brain but over his wolf too."

"Okay. I'm not gonna pretend that I understand everything you said there. Is it reversible?"

"Possibly. There's some strong magic going on here. There's a chance that I won't be able to stop it here, just take precautions against the effects of these bindings and spells."

"That's… good I suppose. What would be the guaranteed way to get rid of it? Cut it off at the head?"

He nodded. "Yup. Whoever is doing this probably has a talisman or something along those lines that he's using to control the poor kid. Take him out or even that talisman out and the pieces can fall in place from there."

"Cool. How do we find the guy then?"

"Give me enough time with the kid, and I can maybe figure it out. I'd also recommend talking to the victims family. I get the feeling it wasn't a completely random murder."

"I've been finding it kinda odd too, it seems a bit too planned out ya know?"

"Yeah. You haven't given me too many details but from what I've heard that's exactly how it sounds." He looked down and kicked his feet a bit. There was a small amount of childishness to the action that confused me. That is until he looked up at me again. "Hey… im… I'm sorry for not telling you sooner. I probably should have, but I didn't want you worrying about me"

I shrugged "I'd have worried about you anyway… but I guess I understand why you didn't. I guess I just figured that was something I had the right to know when the reality of it is I really didn't. That being said, we do need to have a certain amount of discretion with each other from here on out. I am, after all, a detective and work for the police. If there's illegal shit going on I need to know."

He nodded and smiled before putting a hand on my shoulder. I felt the friction in my spine again and felt a bit calmer than I had been. "I understand. I'll keep you in tune with the things you should know. I promise."

I smiled back, unintentionally leaning into his hand. "Good. Now while we are on the truth saying I do have a question that needs to be answered, like soon."

He put on a serious face and put his hands back in his pocket. My arm felt cold all of a sudden, I decided to ignore it.

"Was it you that dropped a meteor on the vamps?"

He thought on it for a second. "Nope. Not that I can remember. That's a pretty powerful spell, takes at least two witches to cast, or at least one really powerful one. I can't do it by myself and I don't think I could convince any of the others to do it with me if I wanted to."

I blinked. "Aren't you like, one of the most powerful witches in the city?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Well yes, but none of my coven are  _ the _ most powerful witch in the city, I'll tell you that right now."

I blinked "Wait… you're not?"

He shook his head "Nope. There's one that's stronger than anyone in the coven."

"Who?"

"Can't say, sorry. I know I promised discretion but he gave up that life, or is trying to. As far as I know he hasn't been an active practitioner for a few years now. Has a wife and family and all that. I'd rather not be the one that ruins that for him."

I raised a brow "sounds to me like he made himself a part of this when he blew up a vamp house for seemingly no reason."

He smirked "how can you be so sure it was for no reason, Moony?"

"I don't think I'm picking up what you're putting down."

He thought on it for just a moment. "What were you doing when the meteor hit?"

I crossed my arms. "Running from a group of vamp-" it hit me pretty hard what he was getting at. "Are you saying he was protecting me?"

Alex nodded "it's a strong chance yeah."

"So it's someone I know then?"

"Not necessarily. But you aren't exactly hidden. Your exploits around this place are known and some people in the supernatural society actually really like you, or at least the idea you represent."

"What's that mean?"

He shrugged "You're kind of seen as a hero… to Some of us. A stubborn, dickish hero but a hero nonetheless."

I scoffed and looked away. "I ain't a damn hero."

He rolled his eyes. "By definition, you are. You fought your natural disposition of, you know, murder and bloodshed and have decided to do something good with your abilities. You're kind hearted, even if you're a bit brash when you do it and you've never hesitated to stop and help someone in need." He pointed over his shoulder at Marcus, who was gently swinging back and forth. "You may not see it, but to some of the people in the underworld, you're a person to look up to."

"I did those things because it's my job, and I chose that job because I didn't have any other option. I didn't do it out of some sense of self righteousness or a want to make the world better. I did it because my other options were significantly less pleasant and less legal by a long shot. Nothing less, nothing more."

He huffed at me, it was honestly kind of cute. "You can choose to keep believing that, but you can't change how people see you, not without doing something drastic that you'd end up regretting, and you can't change the plans the fates have laid out for you."

"Yeah well I ain't just gonna roll over and show my neck to the fates. I know what I am, And I know what my intentions are and the reason I do this. That won't change any time soon."

He rolled his eyes. "You're impossible you know that? Just… look. There's going to be a point in the future where you're going to have to make some seriously difficult decisions. I'm no seer but anyone could see that, especially with what we learned tonight. Make sure you don't let your stubbornness walk you down a dark path, okay?" He walked forward and stood on his toes, placing a kiss on my cheek that sent my brain, and my wolf, into overdrive. I stared at him when he pulled back until I could find my voice.

"Uh… sure… yeah... you got it."

He nodded and smiled bright. "Good! I'll see you later." With that he turned and offered a hand to Marcus, who took it with a gentle smile before both of them walked off, leaving me to deal with my own thoughts.

I figured now was the perfect time to just… go home and get some sleep, so that was exactly what I did. I got up to my apartment, locked the door, kicked off my shoes and passed out on the couch. No regrets.


	9. Chapter 9

Morning came much too soon, and I was not pleased by this fact. When I checked my phone it proudly displayed that it was 12:30. I had a few missed messages, one voicemail, and weirdly enough, a notification for a mobile game I hadn't played in a long while.

I decided to check the messages first, voicemails can wait. The first one was from Alex.

"Hey Moony, you're probably still asleep but I wanted to let you know the kid is doing fine. We got some food in him and he's sleeping right now. Poor guy looked like he'd been starved, though I guess with wolves that's… pretty much all the time. Doing research on the spells now, I'll let you know when I have something."

So that was that problem solved. No worries there, save for him potentially turning again. I chose to not respond, unsure of how that conversation would end up going.

My mom's text was next. "Damien, need to talk to you about a few things involving some big furry messes. Let me know when you have the free time and come over." I sighed, that wouldn't be fun. She'd be pissed that I didn't tell her about this as soon as I found out.

I sighed and typed out a hasty "Alright I'll let you know when I can come over I promise." Before moving on.

The last text was one that got me, a number that wasn't saved into my phone with the simple message of "you've made a mistake."

That was… annoying, and a bit worrisome for a few reasons.

The most pressing was the message itself. Either it could be a warning that my recent actions could lead me down a dark path, to which I said fuck that. A kid needed to be saved, and I had the ability to save him. Alternatively it could be the guy that had done this throwing a piss fit which would just be laughable. That being said, it was worrisome as well because now I was wondering who was giving out my number to random assholes.

I decided I'd deal with that some other time. Empty threats or warnings were the last on my list of things to worry about. Voicemail next. It was from John, and he didn't necessarily sound pleased.

"Damnit Wulfe! Pick up your damn phone, I don't care if you're asleep or not! I need you down at the station as soon as you get this, we've got a name for our John Doe and I want you to go talk to family and friends, so get your ass in gear and get over here!"

I grumbled and checked the notification for when I missed the call. About an hour ago. He couldn't possibly be pleased with me at this point and there was a part of me that didn't care. Regardless of my apathy, I got up and got dressed. Couldn't stay in bed forever, not when there was a job to do. I sighed and walked out the door, almost tripping over something on my way out. I looked down and smirked. My leather jacket was sitting neatly folded on my doorstep. Alex must have brought it up while I was sleeping on his way into work. I made a mental note to thank him, when I felt comfortable talking to him again, and pulled the jacket over my shoulders.

The drive to the station wasn't so bad and traffic was light so it didn't take me long to get there. The station itself, however, was in a bit of a hustle. This happened every so often, things would pile up on the officers and you'd walk in to see people scattering about with various pieces of paperwork trying to get everything they possibly can done all at once. It was honestly a bit amusing to watch, especially since I was just casually strolling into the place like it was nothing, hands in my pockets.

I was at a bit of a disadvantage, however, with having heightened hearing. The different conversations were filling my ears to an almost painful degree. There was talk of domestic abuse, theft, someone talking about the murder I was currently assigned to and Janice, the receptionist, talking about her latest hair appointment and "What Brad did to Melinda" to Some random person on the phone. I rolled my eyes at the last one before walking into Valentine's office and closing the door, thankful for the silence.

"You wanted to see me, Hoss?"

He turned and raised an eyebrow, then checked his watch "Yeah. Like. An hour ago."

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah sorry I was up really late last night getting a kid out of a vampire hideout, so I was a little bit tired. You got a name?"

He sighed then nodded "Yeah I got a name" he turned a folder to face me. "Thomas Sampson. Family lives up north, in the foothills."

I picked up the file and started to flip through it. "What was he doing downtown? That doesn't make much sense…"

John shrugged "Well as far as I can tell it was probably a night of drinking and having fun that got a bit out of hand. Maybe he walked a bit too far away, or ran into the wrong person who knows. No matter what the reason was, he ended up getting killed for it."

"You know I've been thinking about this more and more, and this seems deliberate. I mean we know that a werewolf did it, but I don't think it was as much of an accident as we were thinking, ya know?"

He nodded "I was kinda thinking the same thing. This was intentional. What do you know about our wolf situation?"

"Well I found the wolf," I chose my words very carefully. "But I don't think it was his fault."

He eyed me suspiciously. "What the fuck does that mean?"

I sighed and sat down. "Well having seen him myself he isn't capable of doing something like this of his own volition. Hell I don't even think his wolf is. I think he was just the weapon, not the one with the intentions of making the murder happen."

"And you think that because?"

"I think that because the body placement was odd, a wolf like him isn't going to bring the body somewhere else he's going to eat the body where it's at and leave. This was deliberate planning with influence from elsewhere."

He raised an eyebrow at me. "What you're saying and what I've seen don't add up at all Damien. You're in full control of your wolf, so I think it's safe to say that most werewolves are the same way, is it not?"

"No it's not safe to say that at all. I gained control over my wolf after years of living with the condition, but a new wolf wouldn't be able to. Not without guidance that is."

"And what makes you think this was a new wolf?"

"The kid couldn't have been older than 12, John."

That made him stop and think. After a few moments of contemplation he spoke up again. "Isn't that… impossible though? Didn't you tell me yourself that the change occurs during puberty, as like a side effect of it?"

I sighed "Kind of. It's a result of coming of age, so to speak. Puberty just also happens to occur at the same time. The two are only related in timing really, but aside from that there's not much of a correlation between them that we know of."

"Okay well regardless, a 12 year old probably isn't going to be going through puberty any time soon, usually that occurs closer to like… 14 or 15. So how is it possible that someone can wolf out so young?"

"That's what we're trying to figure out. There's a strong possibility that this is the cause of a spell, and if it is then it would explain the extremely odd set of circumstances surrounding the murder as well, like the placing or the fact that it wasn't completely gnawed on."

"Wait… hold on. We?"

I blushed a bit at that. Oops. "Uh. Yes. I've got a witch helping me out a little bit with this."

He groaned and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Damien do you know how dangerous that is?"

"Of course I do, I stay away from witches if I can help it. But sometimes they're useful, and for the right amount of money even the untrustworthy ones can be sworn to silence. That being said the one that is majorly helping me is trustworthy I can assure you of that."

"And what makes you so sure that you're right?" He raised a brow at me. "What makes you think this one isn't going to manipulate you or use you for their own endgame?"

I thought on it. He had a point, there was always that chance.

_ Do you really think that pretty boy would do that to you? _

He also had a point. I didn't. "I know this one, fairly well too. Besides," I tapped my nose "I've got my ways of sniffing out manipulation." Most times.

He rolled his eyes. "Whatever, but when you end up getting hurt in the end, don't say I didn't warn ya."

I raised an eyebrow. "Is that a bit of concern I'm sensing in your voice Valentine?"

He glared at me. "Don't look too far into things Wulfe. Despite your idiocies, you're actually damn good detective, and a good liaison between the mortal and the supernatural world. Don't fuck that up cus you're thinking with your dick."

I blinked and then sputtered at him. "Hey wait no this ain't anything like that!"

"Whatever you say, I'm just saying, watch yourself around this witch friend of yours."

"I'm serious, it ain't like that. Trust me, I think I'd know."

He rolled his eyes and leaned towards me. "Listen here Wulfe. I ain't here to give you relationship advice, as a matter of fact I wouldn't even say I give two shits of a rat's ass about who you are or aren't sticking your dick into. What I will say, however, is that what you just said could not be further from the truth. The idea that anyone would know immediately that they're interested in someone on some deeper level is a regrettable fallacy. The fact that  _ you _ in particular could ever tell that you're truly interested in someone is downright laughable. Now I'm not saying that you are or aren't interested in this witch, but when was the last time you sat back and actually took a minute to focus on your personal feelings about anyone, not just your job?"

I blinked, taken a bit aback by his accusation, but it did warrant some thought. "Well… I know there are times when I fucking hate you, if that counts for anything."

He cocked a smile. "I get that a lot. Now go talk to the family and get the hell out of my office."

"Fine. I'll go figure some shit out on the mortal side of things." I closed up the file and got up, walking out of the office.

_ He truly did tell you off. _

I raised an eyebrow and started to mumble under my breath. "Did not."

_ Did too. And man I think he was right. We really haven't spent time with anyone. You've been working all the damn time. It's been so boring. _

I got out the door and shrugged "And what do you suggest I do about it huh?"

_ I don't fuckin know. I'm just saying, you're a pack animal who has refused his pack. I don't know if it's healthy. _

"If I don't refuse the pack, they'll force me into responsibilities I don't have the time for."

_ I wasn't talking about your mom's pack. _

"Trust me, I know."


End file.
